Brumi was born five years ago in January, the first of eleven puppies. For her mother Vidra this was the first – and as we had to admit, the last – litter, so she almost had no milk, and I had to feed the puppies five times a day as I had done to Muska.

The kids were intended for our friends, but Brumi was born with such a severe dysplasia that we decided to keep her for ourselves. Our veterinarian told us that from the age of three she would gradually deteriorate and would finally die in great pain.

Brumi slept away yesterday morning, when the computer stopped short. At the age of five, without any deterioration and without pain, after having apparently prepared for it for weeks and having taken leave of the other dogs, with that peaceful final breathing out as newfoundlanders usually put down their head like “well, now everything is all right”.

We take leave of her and say thanks for her with the poem sent by Wang Wei at their birth.

FIRST take a wicker and put it
in water so that it gets rid of its
arrogance, it becomes soft
and pliable, it fills up with love;
then braid it like a dream, and
when the basket is ready, you can
put in it the clean clothes, some
red and golden fruits, or the kitten.
Sometimes it will creak in the night
but this is how the world was made up
and this is how, sometimes, it complains.

Yes, one would not think how much such a little animal can become a part of his life. She is not even the first beloved dog we lose, and nevertheless it is each time invariably painful. Not because of her, for she is already in good hands – “with all its eyes the animal beholds the Open. Free from death. Only we see death; the free animal has its demise perpetually behind it, and before it always God; and when it moves, it moves into eternity, the way brooks and running springs move”, as Rilke describes it so exactly – but because of us, from whose life a part is now lost. Nevertheless we begin it again each time, with a new animal, undertaking and accepting this moment in advance, because it gives much more than we lose, and also because just this loss shows us how much it has enriched our lives.